Tag Archives: Family

Last Friday was supposed to be our grand date night. Valentine’s day plans. I was disappointed that I didn’t get the reservations that I desired for us. There was a daddy-daughter dinner that we missed out on and I was feeling upset over it. Nevertheless, Chloe is 5. She doesn’t know much about restaurants and city attractions. I was going to make something happen. Good times were ahead.

Along the way we stopped at Target for a couple of things and pair of new slippers that I told her we would shop for. I wanted to hurry. We needed to get moving. We needed a great night, I had it planned, and time was awasting. Let’s move!

3 minutes into the door Chloe yells: “Dad I want pizza!”

“No baby, we’re going to dinner. We have to get out of here.”

That wasn’t good enough. Our discussion continued for about 5 minutes until her precious eyes looked up at me and griped me with the finger that I’m wrapped on.

We sat in the café. We ate pizza, drank juice, and talked. I sat there like a fool, trying to be a dad.

I listened to my daughter. Her play dog’s name is macho, her friend at school has transferred out 😦 , we should shop for a new cereal (pops and honey nut cherios are not her favorite anymore), and we should sing more while we drive.

Simplicity can really make you smile. It’s not about how much money you have, or don’t have. It’s good to evaluate the expectations we carry around, they’re nothing but thoughts turned chains. They hold us back from enjoying the moment. What counts is being present. Present in the NOW. Not existing, but LIVING in the moment.

That means letting go of worry….and embracing a little uncertainty as excitement.

Listening rather than assuming

Most of all…loving! Love never allows you to waste. Love. I say again…LOVE!

The moment you are in NOW is both a present from God and a stewardship that you will never get back. Take a moment to take in everything around you and….listen! You’ll be surprised what happens.

Let’s keep this short and simple. Next year I’m taking over the world. Feel free to stay tuned and witness my evil genius at work as I attempt to conquer, create, and collaborate the most massive launching of McZizzle the world has ever seen!

Your thinking:

“he’s got an ego!!”

“This guy is cocky”

or “I want to takeover too!!!”

Before you judge please allow me to make a quote that may help things to be a little more clearer so you see what I mean:

“The ebb and flow of the Atlantic tides, the drift of the continents, the very position of the sun along its ecliptic. THESE are just a FEW of the things I control in my world!” – Master Chief Urgayle

Confused yet? Here’s the point: world domination, huge influence, epic hero stories to tell my daughter when I’m old and grey…they all begin with dominating one thing…….ME!

Therefore, as I have begun my annual review, I realize I can’t look forward til I understand what went wrong.

Get the mind and skills of a CEO with the lifestyle of a fisherman

Business is my craft. I want to be skilled and bring value to every project I touch. That doesn’t mean that I want money or popularity or a spot on The Apprentice. I want to count. I enjoy building up companies from the ground, I love systems, and let’s face it, EVERYBODY needs to lead better and that’s what business is really about…charting a course and LEADING people there!

I’m committing to working my way thru the personal MBA Reading list. I’ve already begun and it hasn’t costed me a dime! Thank God for the free library. Say it with me…..FREE!

I’ve also gained some great links to free education from Marc and Angel’s 12 dozen places to educate yourself. A big thank you to those Carnegie Melon Professors who will be teaching me for free next year. BRAVO!

De-clutter my life

“One does not accumulate but eliminate. It is not daily increase but daily decrease. The height of cultivation always runs to simplicity”
-Bruce Lee

That doesn’t sound epic but it is! Simplicity, living on less, being less dependent on stuff frees me up to live the life I’ve always wanted.

I have a goal to do all my work independent of location. That means I want to be able to work from Starbucks at 12pm everyday if I so choose.

Parent a revolutionary

My biggest priority and mission is to effectively and lovingly parent my daughter Chloe. Be assured, my Princess is not being raised to go to college, get a good job, marry a boy who wears loafers and has a nice degree. No, far be it from me! I pray that Chloe learn to love, sacrifice, fight, cry, and do something bold with her life.

I’m going to be proactive with time that I spend in growing as a dad. Reading, listening to seminars, and being purposeful to spend time with my baby while she’s still my baby! 15 minutes a week reading parenting materials, nightly devotionals, weekly date-night, and an increased bating average (my bating average is the time I spend in one on one conversation with my daughter. No music, movies, TV, or distractions.)

What’s your bating average?

The Ripple Effect

I want this site to be the address of cool. Come here for encouragement, a laugh, and a wake up call!

If you are interesting in building a presence together and learning to build a business online inbox me on facebook or twitter.

Give anonymously and overwhelmingly

about a year ago I made a promise to myself to using the Global Prayer digest to guide my prayers for international missions but now I feel led to go a step further. In 2011 I will select one country to support financially and prayerfully with intensity. Not to say I have abandoned the world, but i want to zoom in and help and learn about one specific region. I’m starting at World Vision’s catalog for giving.

I will be creating a new category to chronicle some of our other exploits such as traveling, pimp-slapping debt, and creating everything else i can’t find. Subscribe and comment often but most of all…develop your own vision for 2011. Don’t read about it on my blog, do something that you love! If you don’t know what to do then schedule some time for thinking and do it! You have been blessed with one life and only a few moments to live it. Live it on purpose!

If you want to do an annual review I invite you to visit Chris Guillebeau’s site to read How to Conduct Your Own Annual Review Let’s give feedback and hopefully help each other out in our preparation for next year!

Ok so here is another one of those posts that you’ll breeze over in your email and think some good thoughts then move on to your next inbox message, tweet, or post…….and you will regret it!

Why? Not only have I listed 5 awesome smack-happy gifts that you can give yourself that are guaranteed to keep on giving but if you really pay attention these are some of the most expensive and rare jewels that people yearn for, and DIE for lack of! My gift to you…..blueprint for a funner, happier life , FOR FREE!

Balance in life can never be overrated. Perhaps you should start a garden, pickup on an old hobby, or take a class. I always thought simplicity came from staying organized but that’s not the case. A wise man said “there are no lazy people: only those who are sick or uninspired”. So often the clutter and ‘space mis-management’ we exhibit is a result of having no emotional fuel to find simplicity.

This year as I stepped out and started doing more things and trying to add value to myself I see now that I am more prone to get organized and do things that bring about balance in my life. I’m one of those people who cannot sit down to study until his desk is clean. Now as I do more of the things I have always wanted to do I feel more energetic and stay on task with keeping things simple and balanced! I have not totally arrived yet but I would not trade this simplicity for all the tea in china

It may be a little off but in some way or another we are all looking for fame. If you would unwrap yourself from yourself and get devoted to something bigger than yourself, you would gain great influence in the world. Not self-centered jerk fame, but widespread hope infusing smile creating heart warming passion inspiring flame. Get over yourself!

Example: Check out my new friend Joni at Every[1] counts. She has totally devoted herself to serving God in a major way by giving a voice to those who are unheard of. I believe in what she does therefore I am writing about her so that you can read about her…hence, fame! (see all the mentions here!!??? I’m not paid by Joni or anything. She is just a great person on my anti-suck list who I want people to know about)

3. A Board of Directors….estimated value: $657,853.27

The first responsibility of any Board of Directors is to protect and extend value. A board of directors enhances a business by adding oversight, insight, comparative thoughts, and often times, common sense where it is lacking. I own a business, as do you. My business is called Erik McEntyre, Inc. Your business is called

________(insert your name) Incorporated

To manage this business I have gathered some of the best and brightest to add the greatest value to my endeavors. Allow me to demonstrate:

Scott- 55

Dale-52

Daniel-52

Thom-45

Bernard-47

Total: 250

That’s 250 years of experience, education, mistakes, success, and wisdom THAT I DO NOT HAVE. And guess what? It’s readily available to me. These are the names of the top 5 men in my life. They have the power to hold me accountable, encourage me, rebuke or correct, whatever is needed. You know how I know? I asked them to.

All it takes to build your board is to list the names of those individuals who possess values and skills/talents that you do not have and TELL THEM. Tell them how important they are to you. Share your love for them. Let them know how you feel about them and where you would be without them. Then submit. I love that word. I submit to the authority and presence of each of these great men. Note: I advise using men, if you are a man, for females vice versa.

Where did I get that value from? I made it up. Low estimate.

4. Education….estimated value: ability to find, sustain, or create a job and freedom!

Without education you have absolutely no power. So get it…for FREE!

Education paradigms in America need to be re-examined. Schools are pretty much becoming factories of manufacturing 9-5 zombies. More and more organizations are realizing that its not always the letters behind someone’s name as much as it is the value and innovation they bring to the table. I plan to be ahead of the curve.

For example, tonight I am going to the library after work. I plan on starting my way thru the Personal MBA Reading list, my thanks to Sean Ogle by the way. I have a busy schedule and things to do for my daughter for Christmas but if I don’t do it…it wont get done. Make time!

5. Breakfast with someone you love

Simple as it is. It’s the greatest pleasure. This Saturday morning, Christmas, I am looking forward to a rendezvous with a very special woman. My 5 year old, Chloe.

Everyone is welcome to join but she is my special guest. I even found the recipe I’m going to put together: Sausage Breakfast Casserole.

Besides breakfast you should develop the habit of saying YES to more opportunities to build healthy relationships and do stuff that you normally don’t do.

If I told you to stop everything you’re doing and take a break would you do it? If I asked for you to surrender your cell phone, email access, day planner, car keys, and facebook for 12 hours what would be your reaction?

You’d probably panic.

Think about it, you go thru tons of email, phone calls, text messages in just an hour. There is so much information passing between your ears you can’t afford to step out. You might miss something, someone might miss you, OR the world might go on just as it is proving that things aren’t as intense as you think.

The sad truth is that our buzzed hyper-blab culture has bred in us a bad sense of on-the-go-ism that verges on the edge of religious zealotry. We spend our days plugged into things so much that its hard to stay tuned-in to all that’s important about our life. Before you know it we end up acting out of a sense of responsibility to be busy. The problem with this lifestyle is that while we juggle our list of contacts, status updates, meetings, and hour by hour babble we miss out on things that we will never get back. Children grow up, opportunities for making more money pass by, spouse’s grow distant, and the world around us changes without us ever taking note of it.

Wake up! Your life is not slowing down and nobody is going to stop the merry-go-round for you to get off. Act now!

A great place to start is to unplug. It’s Sunday, take some time to get in touch with what your life is about. I refer to Marc Angel’s 20 questions to give you a blueprint for your thoughts. One of the best gifts you will give yourself is the ability to gauge whether you are living on purpose or just moment to moment.

Embrace simplicity for your schedule. Regardless if your a hairdresser, cashier, executive, or stay at home parent your time is more precious than you know. Once you spend it there is no getting it back…EVER. Today you should have a grasp on where you need to be by tomorrow night. Once you figure out your basic goals for the next day strip everything away that is unessential. I know…you’re thinking: I’m so caught up on facebook, twitter, etc that I doubt that I will get free! What you must understand is that the first accomplishment is that you have trained your mind to recognize the meat from the fat. As one man said it, I’d rather aim at something and miss than shoot at nothing and hit it every time.

But that’s not the end…….

Just because you stop doing the wrong things doesn’t get you out of the woods, it points you in the right direction. Little changes over time will add up to tremendous results in the long run.You have to get simple and stay realistic.

I’m not a minimalist. I am a huge fan of Everett Bogue however. Everett is a very famous and renown minimalist. There are some aspects of minimalist thinking and lifestyle that should never be ignored. Everett offers a free e-book that you can download and read in one night. It’s called the Minimalist Workday. You need to download it NOW, read it twice, implement the useful ideas (for me I loved #’s 18-30) and pass it along asap! Its totally free so there should be nothing from stopping you from getting it.

Finally, you have to make demands. Starting right now you must demand more from your life than from anywhere else. Fight for the inches that add up to success. It may sound revolutionary but if you find yourself in an unhappy unproductive situation that you use busyness to find an escape from then you need to make serious changes. Most people I meet are so plugged in to all the non-essentials of life because they hate their job. The solution is simple….QUIT. Fire your boss. Make a plan to work for yourself. Secure your inner circle of consul that will help to make the right decisions. Gather significant resources.

A great starting point is the e-book SMALLTOPIA. It is an absolutely helpful book that serves as a practical guide to getting started making some good income. Notice i say ‘Practical’, not philosophical or theoretical. It’s to the point and inspiring. Invest in yourself.

“Despite the challenge, the number of mom-owned, home-based businesses is on the rise. Entrepreneur magazine coined the term mompreneur for the female business owner who is actively balancing the role of mom and the role of entrepreneur. The magazine even has a column that’s dedicated to the challenges of the mompreneur.”

In this article Jill Chase gives an introduction to the new wave of successful mom’s and gives some resources to get you started in your mompreneur endeavors

Mom, be encouraged that you are doing a great godly work at caring for a family and it is a unique calling to raise children, not a curse. You are equipped to do great and wonderful things in spite of, rather than instead of. You can do all things!